


Messing With Gender Categories

by insatiablerealist



Series: Bill and the Time Lords [2]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Ending, Discussion of Gender, Everybody Lives, Gen, Nonbinary Character, Post-Season/Series 10, They/them pronouns for the Doctor eventually
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-01
Updated: 2019-04-01
Packaged: 2019-12-30 04:04:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18307829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/insatiablerealist/pseuds/insatiablerealist
Summary: After getting the Doctor's perspective on Time Lord feelings about binary gender, or the lack thereof, Bill decides to ask Missy for her opinion, as part of an effort to get to know her better.Sequel to "21st Century Earth Terms," taking place in an AU where everyone stayed alive and together after The Doctor Falls.





	Messing With Gender Categories

**Author's Note:**

> It's not entirely necessary to read the first fic in this series, but this one might make more sense if you do. I didn't really flesh out what happened in this universe, but I imagined that Missy's trip with everyone in World Enough and Time still went badly, but no one died/regenerated/became a Cyberman and they all went back to the university afterward. Nardole isn't in this fic, but presumably he's fine too. 
> 
> Disclaimer: my desire for representation of my own nonbinary identity definitely informed the writing of this, but I don't entirely agree with the Time Lord perspective on gender as expressed here.

After the chaos of Missy’s first outing in the TARDIS, she was relegated to the vault once more. This decision precipitated an argument which Bill avoided like the plague, but she couldn’t help overhearing bits of it. (“I placed my trust in you! You promised nothing was going to go wrong!” “How was I supposed to know we’d run into my past self?” “Because it’s literally yourself!”) Bill was just glad she made it back in one piece. The previous regeneration of the Master seemed much more dangerous than Missy. 

Bill knew this didn’t make sense, because they were both the same person, so she spent a good bit of the time Missy was back in the vault interrogating her own feeling toward the other Time Lord (or Time Lady. Whatever). Despite her knowledge that Missy had committed all the same atrocities and more as her past self, he was just so much more unpleasant, with all the blatant misogyny and insults. Missy delivered her insults more sweetly, even if they were really just as mean.

Then Bill started wondering if she had internalized sexist assumptions by regarding Missy as less capable of evil and violence than her male incarnation. Eventually Bill dismissed this concern. She had valid reasons for trusting Missy slightly more than the other Master. She knew her better, for one thing. The Doctor had also assured her that Missy was in a much better place than the Master had been before, even if she was currently on lockdown. 

And she would never admit it to anyone, but Bill had to acknowledge, in the back of her mind, that a tiny part of her found Missy attractive. Not that she would ever let than consciously affect her opinion of her evil-ness, but, well. Bill had always had a bit of a weakness for a pretty woman. Or, apparently, a female anthropomorphic alien. Not that that mattered, because the Doctor seemed to have some sort of weird thing with her. And also she was definitely still partially evil. 

So, while she was relieved that Missy was back in the vault for now, Bill wasn’t completely terrified of her anymore. In fact, a part of her wanted to get to know her better. Before the run-in with the former Master, the Doctor had been all for “team bonding,” as he horribly described it once. Bill decided to find out if he still thought that was a good idea. 

The opportunity came up at the end of one of their lessons. “Good work this week, Bill.” The Doctor said. “As much as I’d be happy to move onto the next topic right now, I promised Missy I’d bring her Chinese takeaway.” 

As he got up from his desk, Bill said, “Hey, actually, about Missy.” 

He stopped where he stood. “Yes?” 

“I’ve been thinking. Back before her test with us went wrong, you seemed like you wanted me to talk to her more. Get acquainted. Is that still a thing, or do you want me to keep away?” Bill asked.

The Doctor looked at her curiously. “I thought you wanted nothing to do with her. And that the other Master would have surely frightened you off for good, which I wouldn’t blame you for.” 

Bill shrugged. “Yeah, that’s what I thought too. But I guess . . . now that I’ve seen how she used to be, I actually believe you when you say she’s better now.”

“Huh.” The Doctor smiled to himself. “Don’t tell her that. She’ll hate to know that her past wrongdoings are actually improving her current reputation.” 

Bill grinned. “So does that mean I can talk to her?”

“You know she’s not allowed out of the vault. I don’t know when I’ll feel comfortable revoking that.”

“I know. But you go in there, right? Can I do that too?”

The Doctor leaned back against the wall, clearly thinking it over. 

“I s’pose if you think she’s dangerous, you could be there too, but I figured—“

“She’d be suspicious if we both went in together,” he finished.

“Yeah, exactly.”

“I’ll see how she feels about it tonight. If she doesn’t look too murderous, I think it’ll probably be fine. And if you do meet her one-on-one, I’ll make sure I’m nearby if . . . something happens.”

The Doctor made that sound quite ominous, but Bill had made up her mind, and once she decided to do something she wasn’t one to back down. So when the Doctor invited her to go down to the vault the next week, she was ready. Or so she told herself. 

As she walked into the vault, Bill was surprised at how nervous she felt. Traveling with the Doctor had removed a lot of her anxiety, and she had survived one interaction with Missy in a much less controlled environment. But even so, when the doors opened and she saw the Time Lady sitting there, with the same purple corset and dramatic hairdo, her heart fluttered, in a bad way. 

“Have you come to gawk at me like an attraction in a zoo?” Missy said sharply as Bill stepped hesitantly forward. 

“Hi Missy. No, uh, I just wanted to say hello.”

“Which you’ve just done.” Missy stared at her pointedly, and Bill felt her skin begin to crawl.

“Yeah, I guess I have.” Bill gave a slight laugh. “Well, our first meeting didn’t go too great, so I wanted to try to get to know you better.”

Missy snorted. “I normally don’t concern myself with species as unintelligent as yours. What makes you think I’ll make an exception for you?”

“The Doctor’s the only other Time Lord you’ve got, right? And you don’t seem to enjoy his company most of the time either. So would you rather be left on your own, or make fun of me for a bit?” Bill asked. She hoped she could appeal to Missy’s desire to mock her. 

“When you put it like that, I could use some entertainment. Come sit.” Bill did not at all like the way she instinctively felt a need to follow Missy’s command, but she did as she was told anyway. As she sat stiffly on the chair opposite Missy, the Time Lady spoke again. “Why are you really here? Your kind don’t usually subject themselves willingly to my disparagement.”

Bill shrugged. “I wasn’t kidding, I’d like to have a better interaction with you. And also . . .” An idea struck her. “I’d like to learn more about Time Lords in general. You know, I’ve only got the Doctor telling me stuff.”

“Oh, my dear, you can’t believe a word of that half the time,” Missy scoffed. 

“Yeah, exactly. I figured I could get a more balanced perspective if I talked to you, too.”

Missy smiled. “I suppose that’s a reasonable request. Although I don’t usually play the role of teacher like the Doctor is so fond of doing.” 

“I kind of guessed that. But I’m pretty curious,” Bill said, smiling hopefully. “If we tell the Doctor about this, he’ll probably let you out of the vault again sooner.”

“Oh, all right,” Missy sighed. “What do you want to know?”

Bill spent the next few minutes asking most of the questions she’d asked the Doctor when she first found out he wasn’t human, mostly just because she wanted to know if Missy’s perspective would be significantly different. For the most part, they both gave the same explanations, except Missy was even snarkier. But the conversation went surprisingly smoothly, and Bill found herself gradually relaxing.

“That’s all the basics covered,” Missy said when Bill’s questions slowed. “Don’t you want to know anything more interesting? I’m getting bored.”

Bill remembered the time she asked the Doctor about Time Lords and gender, and how he told her to ask Missy too. “Well, if this is too personal you don’t have to answer,” she began. “But I still don’t entirely understand how Time Lords think about gender. I mean, I know you used to be a man, but do you even believe in categories like ‘man’ and ‘woman’?”

Missy gave her a look. “The Doctor told you to talk to me about that, yes?”

Bill looked sheepish. “Yeah. I asked if you felt the same way he does, and he said I’d have to ask you myself. I swear I wasn’t gonna bother you initially, but. I got curious.”

“Yes, curiosity certainly seems to be your defining characteristic.” Bill wasn’t sure if that was meant as an insult or a compliment. Probably an insult. “Honestly, I don’t think about it that much. The Doctor is much more philosophical about these things than I am.” Missy stretched back in her chair, kicking her legs up over one arm, and fiddled with her skirt. “I do enjoy being a woman this time around. Such a fun change.” 

“It must be so strange,” Bill said.

“Waking up in a new body is strange no matter what. Time Lords don’t think physical sex makes as much difference as humans seem to. It’s fairly common for us to change sex at some point. It’s much rarer to be like the Doctor, I mean, thirteen bodies all the same? Quite a bizarre coincidence.” 

“Wait a minute, thirteen?”

“Oh, you’ll just have to ask the Doctor about that one. Not my story to tell, although you probably won’t hear it unless I do.”

“Okay, fine,” Bill grumbled. “Hasn’t he gotten bored, then?”

“Again, not my story to tell. But yes, I believe they have,” Missy said. 

“They? But—”

“Let me guess, you asked them if you should use something other than ‘he’ and they told you not to bother.”

“Yeah.”

Missy sighed and smiled, but it was a sad smile. “They don’t like spelling it out for people, but they’d prefer it if people didn’t think of them as a man. Including the pronouns used to refer to them. They always say it’s too ungainly in English, but if you ask me, that’s just because they don’t want anyone to make a fuss about it. In some of their younger incarnations, they were more comfortable taking the male role. But it’s never fit quite right on this one.”

Bill turned the different pronouns over in her mind, adjusting to thinking of the Doctor as “them” rather than “him.” Over the years, a few of her friends had come out to her, so she was used to making such a mental adjustment. And the Doctor was already so outside of common human categories that it made sense that they wouldn’t fit into binary human gender either. “But you’re okay with ‘she,’ right?” Bill asked.

“Oh, yes. It’s been so long since I’ve lived on Gallifrey, I don’t mind adopting human binaries about this sort of thing. And after so many years being seen as a man, it’s so refreshing to hear someone use the other set. That’s why I insist on ‘Missy,’ you know.”

“Yeah, I wondered about that,” Bill said. “Because in English, it’s pretty archaic to assume that ‘Master’ means man.”

Missy rolled her eyes. “Oh, I know you human feminists say that. But I was bored! It’s so fun to have all these pretty, frilly things, and a different name.” She fluffed her skirt again.

“You know, you could have had that even before this regeneration. Lots of humans transition—”

“Oh, of course I know that, Time Lords have been messing with gender categories longer than your species existed. I keep telling the Doctor they should grow their hair out, and it seems they’re finally listening to me. But I just wasn’t feeling it until this body.”

“Huh, I guess that’s fair. Obviously I’ll never be able to really imagine what any of that’s like.”

“No, your tiny human brain could never comprehend such a thing,” Missy said derisively. 

“Hey!”

“What, you said I could make fun of you!”

Bill shrugged. “Yeah, I guess I did. But I think that’s enough for today, if you don’t mind. I’ve got to work on a paper for the Doctor.” 

“You’d better be sure to tell them how I didn’t try to murder you even once,” Missy said as Bill stood to go. 

She laughed. “Yeah, fine.” When she reached the vault door, she turned back. “This was nice. Can I stop by again sometime? I could bring you chips or something.” 

Missy looked up, considering. “Yes, I suppose that would be tolerable.” 

“Okay, Missy. See you around.” As she climbed the stairs out of the basement, Bill decided that that went better than she could have hoped. 

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to write something with Bill and Missy, but I also wanted to start using they pronouns for the Doctor even though I didn't do that in the last fic. Hence, this was born. I'm still grappling with how to describe Time Lord gender. Theoretically, they shouldn't adhere to human binary categories, but because they exist on a TV show written by cis people, they do. I'm still not satisfied, so I might add to this series if inspiration strikes again.
> 
> If you liked it, please leave a comment or hit me up on [tumblr](http://wheretheeternalare.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
